Christmas 2006: All Photos

You can view all my Christmas photos here:

AAFL: Flapjax Hobble Harrison!

From the Commish:

Congratulations to the Flapjax on winning their second AAFL Championship. Perhaps for many of the Homers it also bodes well because it is the the first time Petton Manning is on the winning end as well.

Christmas 2006, Part III: Brazil and Back Again

Rachel had to work Christmas Day, so I was on my own for my trip to Brazil. My immediate family had brunch (pancakes, Krispy Kremes, and other assorted brunchy foods) and then exchanged presents. My nephew Brian received the bulk of these, mostly related to Cars. Afterward, my sister, brother-in-law, and I hung around the house while mom prepared dinner. I may have also taken a nap, although I insist I was just resting my eyes. Later the extended Wegner family came over for a feast of turkey, mashed potatoes, and other such holiday foods. I left, stuffed as usual, for home to meet Rachel for our exchanging of gifts. As already mentioned here, Rachel got me the very awesome gift of a Drew Brees Saints jersey which I immediately put on (I'd still have it on, but my employer frowns on football jerseys as business appropriate attire). All in all, a very satisfying Christmas. Merry Christmas to you all!

Christmas 2006, Part II: The Bedford Experience

For part two of Rachel's and my Christmas holiday, we headed down to Bedford in Southern Indiana. We made a brief pit stop in Martinsville (or "Martintucky" as I heard it called by a friend once). The gas station we stopped at warned us with two giant posters that shoes and shirts were required. I've never been to a gas station without my shirt, and certainly not my shoes (who drives barefoot???), but apparently this is a problem if the two prominent signs were any indications.

After passing through the evil city, we arrived in Bedford before the rest of my wife's family members. We decided to waste some time and drive through town. I'd make a list of things we saw with snarky comments, but honestly I don't remember seeing anything that made an impression on me. I guess that's a snarky enough comment.

Once everyone arrived in Bedford, we assumed our usual positions in the living room (the furniture has remained in the same exact position for at least the last three years I've been going there) before indulging in that holiday tradition of Captain D's chicken. Apparently Rachel's grandmother, sweet as she can be, had made us all lasagna. On Thanksgiving. And stored it in the garage. During an Indiana "heat wave" that saw temperatures in the 60's. Despite her attempts to convince us the lasagna was edible, we boycotted the lasagna and Rachel's Uncle Bret found chicken fingers for us a Captain D's. Odd choice for a holiday meal, but it worked.

Following a mid-afternoon round of Scattergories (the two non-past/future IU attending adults won the most), we got to open presents. The presents largely centered around Rachel's cousins Kate and Mary. The latter is usually given mass quantities of toys and video games that I can play with. Alas, she's in sixth grade now, and is now only receiving clothes. This does me absolutely no good. Fortunately, Rachel and I did receive some nice gifts including a couple of games to keep me busy in the days to come.

Coming tomorrow: Christmas 2006, Part III: Brazil and Back Again

Obsessed?

This will be covered more in part III of my Christmas 2006 saga, but I thought I put up a quick sneak preview of one of my Christmas gifts.












I'm still confused why people think I'm obsessed with Drew Brees though.

Christmas 2006, Part I

Celebrating Christmas this year was not just a single event, but a trilogy of events. Over the next few days, I'll post pictures and comments from everything from turkeys to presents to road trips.






Rachel and I started Christmas out by hosting our first ever Christmas dinner. Rachel cooked her first ever turkey (to be fair, I did help by taking it out of the oven) and everyone seemed to agree that it tasted wonderful. We weren't quite sure how you carve a 20 lbs. turkey, but fortunately Martha Stewart was able to help. She has a website where you can not only read how to carve a turkey, but watch her show you how to carve it. Of course, her turkey was perfectly evenly browned, each piece came with a sliver of skin, and none of the pieces broke off in chunks. Ours may not have been fit for TV, but the turkey sure tasted good.


My parents and paternal grandparents, Rachel's maternal parents and grandparents, Rachel's aunt, and Rachel's brother and sister-in-law were the guests. After stuffing ourselves, we turned our make shift dining room back into a living room (our formal dining room not be existent yet) and exchanged presents. Everyone seemed happy with their gifts. Rachel, who was receiving all of her gifts that day since she had to work Christmas Day, received the bulk of the gifts. In fact, she had so many presents, that you almost couldn't see her behind the stack of boxes. Also of note was the fact that almost everything was packaged in Christopher & Banks and Victoria Secret boxes. The C&B boxes weren't a surprise since Rachel and her mom have saved every box since the early '90s. However, we're still trying to figure out why Rachel's mom has so many VS boxes???

Speaking of early '90s, I did receive a copy of Beverly Hills 90210 - The Complete First Season - on DVD. In college I was watching 90210 four times a day in reruns (if mom and dad see this, this was after I completed laborious hours studying). This show for me is really like a part of the family, or at least a roommate. It seems I could recall much of my high school and college experiences by what was going on with 90210 at the time. I've told stories before about some girl I dated or place I was visiting by labeling it as "about the same time Brandon was dating the ice skater and Brenda worked at that fancy clothes boutique." Ah, memories. Yes, it's quite possible I need professional help.

Coming Soon...Christmas 2006, Part II: The Bedford Experience.

Christmas Party

Here's a picture of Rachel and I at my work Christmas party. Actually they call it a "holiday" party as if we can't figure out by the holly and pine trees what holiday is actually being celebrated.

NFL: MVP - Brees vs. Tomlinson

My friend Jason has asked me if I could make the case for Drew Brees over LaDainian Tomlinson for MVP. I'm sure it will not surprise anyone that I do indeed have an opinion on this, so (at the risk of furthering my wife's opinion that I am in love with a certain NFL QB) here are my thoughts as well as a plethora of stats to back up my assertions.

1. Most VALUABLE player. LaDainian Tomlinson puts up great numbers and scores seemingly multiple times ever single game. However, he also plays with a talented QB (Phllip River's numbers compare favorably to Drew Brees' in SD last year) and a dominant defense (giving up less than 100 yards rushing is just one of their impressive statistics). LT also plays for the always conservative Marty Schottenheimer for whom the term "Marty Ball" was coined to describe a coach who gets a small lead and then runs the ball to avoid turnovers and run the clock down. This means that there are games where LT is frequently piling up yards long after games are over and in situations where most coaches would not dare run the ball, giving him much inflated stats. Despite all of this, LT only contributes 41% of his team’s offensive yardage. Drew Brees is vastly more valuable as he contributes over 75% of his team’s total yards despite not having any of the factors that inflate how good he and his team are. It's hard to make an argument that a player that makes up three-quarters of his teams offense is not more valuable than a guy who makes up less than half of his team's offense. Plus, Brees has been responsible for nearly two thirds of this teams first down, while LT is apart of less than half of first downs for his team.

2. Vast improvement. Brees has increased NO's yardage 27% over the year before (SD's yardage per game has only change less than 5%) over the previous year. But all that would be meaningless without improvements in wins. Brees has taken a team that won 3 games last year and has not made the playoffs since 2000 and led them to a NFC South Division championship. Making that fact more impressive is the fact that the NFC South was said in the preseason to be one of the toughest in football and was the home of Sports Illustrated's pick for Super Bowl Champion, the Carolina Panthers. Individually, Brees has improved his completions, completion percentage, yards per game, and TDs while decreasing the number of turnovers he has thrown.

3. The preseason poll factor. Every year in college football is a preseason poll. The poll is based on nothing but opinions (no game have been played to have concrete data!), but anyone not in the top 10 will certainly have a hard time moving up. Consider undefeated Boise State which started so low in the preseason polls that it was impossible to gain enough respect to crack the top two. Now in the NFL, LT was obviously going to be considered a MVP candidate before the season even started. He was coming off an impressive year and was virtually unanimous in being a top three fantasy pick. So LT has always been front and center in the race. Drew Brees was almost an afterthought; not just of NFL players, but of the free agent class. Daunte Culpepper and Terrell Owens were seen as much bigger free agent signings than Brees. They both got considerable attention in the preseason. Overall, Brees was barely ranked in the top 15 of most sources fantasy picks, not overall, but of quarterbacks. This inattention has always surrounded Brees since his college days at Purdue where he broke multiple Big 10 records, but could only manage a top four finish for the Heisman trophy. Despite all of this lack of knowledge about Brees, media, players, coaches and fans have elevated him into the top two of the MVP discussion. He has impressed virtually everyone with his play this year and is largely seen as one of the main reasons that this New Orleans team has been turned around. The fact that Brees' name is even in the MVP discussion is a testament to how well he has played because so often MVP discussions center around "big name" players, not who is playing the best or is actually the most valuable to his team.

4. Community impact. Everyone knows of the devastation that New Orleans and the Gulf Coast area have suffered. Brees and his wife decided when he came to New Orleans that they would move into the heart of the city, near places hit hard by Hurricane Katrina. Brees, despite not being from the area or even having ties to the Gulf Coast, has been seen out in the community meeting people, giving donations and has set up his own charity for the people of the area. ESPN sportswriter Bill Simmons even commented that Brees probably deserved Sports Illustrated's Man of the Year because of all his contributions to the city and surrounding neighborhoods. While other professional athletes are giving their sports a black mark with suicide attempts, gun charges, shootings at strip clubs, spitting on players, and brawls on the field, Brees has become a national example of how athletes should act in their community.

5. History. Major League Baseball has the same discussion every year: How to compare a DH or pitcher to an everyday player. Pitchers only pitch every three to five days, DHs don't play offense, but position players are on the field for usually nine innings, everyday of the season. That is one reason why only one non-everyday position player has been a league MVP in the last 20 years. The same logic could apply to football. Drew Brees has taken over 900 snaps this season whereas LT has only touched the ball 366 times. Brees' position is far more complex than LT's. Quarterbacks must make quick reads, call audibles, and make sure the ball gets to the correct player. No one doubts the performance LT has put on this year, but the quarterback position has a built in degree of difficulty that makes what Brees has done even more impressive. That is why, like baseball considering everyday position players as more valuable a player than pitchers and DHs, historically more QBs have been named MVP than any other position.

6. Drew Brees has a degree in Industrial Management from Purdue University ('01). I have no statistics to back this up, but it's pretty common knowledge that Industrial Management majors from Purdue are among the best at their professions and all around great guys.

Troy
BSIM, Purdue '99

NFL: Generous Comments on Brees

I swear I neither made up this article, nor did I cry while reading it. But's wonderful to read someone beside me talk about how great Drew Brees has represented his new team and (by prior association) his university.

Bill Simmons, ESPN.com:

"Anyway, I thought Drew Brees should have been named Sports Illustratred's Sportsman of the Year and would have been more upset until I realized that it's not 1977 and SI's opinion doesn't matter that much anymore. Brees exemplified everything you'd ever want from a sportsman in a given year: He took an enormous gamble by signing with the Saints last spring when they were in shambles; he fought back from a serious injury and ended up playing his position about as well as it could be played; he gave himself to a wounded city, played a huge role in its ongoing recovery process and turned a below-average team into a playoff contender; and his consistency from week to week was remarkable. With the possible exception of Roger Federer, was there a more memorable, inspirational, talented and influential sportsman in 2006 than Drew Brees? I say no."